Today's News

It was the first school day after the actual anniversary, on Sunday. It also recalled an event that has receded far enough into the past that none of these middle school students can remember where they were on Sept. 11, 2001. They were too young at the time.

Monty Coleman, assistant fire chief with the Forest Volunteer Fire Department, believes the events of Sept. 11, 2001, should be remembered more than they are.

“In my eyes, it’s a shame we don’t remember it every single day,” Coleman said Friday.
That’s why he was more than willing to attend Forest Elementary School’s 9/11 Commemoration assembly held at the school last week.

That was the advice a Broadway actress gave Jefferson Forest High School drama students Friday about how to be successful in that business.
And, she added, “you have to be lucky.”
Jennifer Simard has been both and she shared with the JF students in Spence White’s drama classes the ups and downs of pursuing an acting career.

By all accounts September 11, 2001 started out as a typical Tuesday. Most Americans were simply going about their daily lives -- children were headed to school, folks were commuting to work. But all of that changed in an instant. At 8:46 that morning the first hijacked airplane struck the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. And in that moment life for all Americans was forever changed.

President Obama has lately had either bad publicity or watched on the sidelines as most of the media’s attention has been on Republican candidates for his job.

But all that changed with his Sept. 8 speech to a Joint Session of Congress. The president laid out his plan for a $447 billion jobs program that would put people back to work on the nation’s infrastructure of roads and bridges.

It just happened that this was the same day a federal appeals court dismissed Virginia’s lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the personal insurance mandate in President Obama’s healthcare law. A three judge panel ruled that the challenge lacked legal standing to bring the lawsuit.